Frisee with Toasted Pecans, Blue Cheese and Burnt Cherries

One of my favorite brunch dishes is salade lyonnaise. Building off the theory that everything tastes better with bacon and a poached egg on top, it is one of the greatest salads around, but perhaps not one that is fit for weeknight dining, and certainly not one that is vegetarian-friendly. Removing just the bacon for the non-meat-eaters or removing just the egg for the oophobes would throw the entire salad out of whack: Bacon’s smoky saltiness complements the rich creaminess of eggs beautifully. After all, bacon and eggs go together like, well, bacon and eggs.

I wanted a simpler, vegetarian salad that still highlighted the bracing bitterness of frisee with notes of smoke, salt, crunch and creaminess, all tied together with a tart vinaigrette. Nuts were a no-brainer substitution for the crunch factor; blue cheese provided welcome creaminess and replaced some of bacon’s salt and savoriness. To balance the blue cheese with some brighter notes, and to add the missing smoky element, my eyes turned to the bowl of cherries on the counter. (I find myself making a lot of recipes with cherries and pecans, and that’s because they’re so damn good together.) Ever since I got Seven Fires by the Argentine chef Francis Mallmann, I’ve been wanting to grill, sear and chareverything. Cooking fruit and incorporating it into savory dishes might be my new favorite culinary trick, and it works here: The smoky charred cherries mingle beautiful with the vinaigrette and add bright treble notes to offset the bass of the blue cheese.

Best of all, it’s a much simpler salad to make than salade lyonnaise. The pecans and cherries can be cooked in the same skillet, and that’s the only pan to wash up. I’m not saying this will be the featured dish at a special brunch, but it can certainly be served as a quick and fast weeknight dinner, as well as a delicious side dish to heartier fare.

1 head of frisee (and/or escarole)

2 handfuls of pecans

1 bowl of cherries (about 2 handfuls)

1 clove of garlic

1 T Dijon mustard

1 T sherry vinegar

1/2 T balsamic vinegar

olive oil, as needed (about 1/2 c)

2 oz. excellent blue cheese (Gorgonzola, Stilton, Maytag, etc.)

Cut the root end off the frisee. Wash and dry thoroughly. Tear into pieces into a large mixing bowl. Set aside.

Heat up a cast-iron skillet over medium-low heat. Add the pecans and toast carefully, shaking the skillet occasionally, until they become fragrant, about 2 minutes. Watch them carefully: You don’t want burned pecans.

Add the pecans to the frisee. Return the empty skillet to the burner and set the heat to medium-high.

Tear the cherries in halve and remove their pits and stems. (I find it easier to tear and pit the cherries with my fingers than to cut them with a knife.) When the skillet is good and hot, add the cherries cut side down. Don’t touch them for a good 2 minutes: Let them get a nice sear on them. When they have some char on them, flip them over with a spatula and cook on the other side for 1-2 minutes.

While the cherries are cooking, make the vinaigrette: Mash the garlic and a pinch of salt into a paste with the mortar and pestle, then stir in the mustard and the vinegars. (I’m just about over balsamic vinegar, but here it adds a little sweetness that rounds out the dressing and bridges the cherries with the blue cheese.) Whisk in enough olive oil to form a creamy vinaigrette.

When the cherries are ready, add them to the frisee and pecans. Add the vinaigrette and toss the salad. Crumble in half of the blue cheese and toss the salad thoroughly. Transfer the salad to a serving dish, making sure some of the pecans and cherries end up on top of the salad, then crumble on the remaining blue cheese. Serve.